


Closer

by stephanericher



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Physical Disability
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-02
Updated: 2015-06-02
Packaged: 2018-04-02 14:06:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4062775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stephanericher/pseuds/stephanericher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>for a prompt on tumblr: Kise runs into an old friend at the coffee shop, but he's undergone some surprising changes since they last saw each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Closer

**Author's Note:**

> for uneplumesombre on tumblr, hope you like...! and i hope you approve of where i went with this haha
> 
> [prompt source](http://awful-aus.tumblr.com/post/119822281312/submitted-au-254)

Once again, Kise scans the coffee shop; there are no open seats—scratch that, there’s one; there’s an empty table, too, but when is his damn latte going to be ready?

“Skim no foam cinnamon chai, extra hot?”

That would be him. He smiles at the barista, grabbing his drink from the bar and practically sprinting over to the table—only at that very moment, someone else, carrying what’s presumably a drip coffee, is right there on the opposite side. He plunks his drink down and looks up—he’s about the same height as Kise, and there’s something very familiar in those steely eyes.

“Ryouta?” he says, and Kise can hear that tone so clearly he almost steps backward.

“Shougo-kun?”

Shougo grins. “Dude. What are you doing here?”

“I go to school here,” says Kise, deciding that the conversation includes an invitation to sit down.

It’s only then that he notices that Shougo’s left sleeve is empty, dragging on the table as he pulls out his chair. Kise doesn’t stare, but he almost frowns—this isn’t something he can really ask about right now, considering he hasn’t seen Shougo in about ten years. Still, his mind is racing like a hyperactive gerbil on an exercise wheel—how did it happen? When? Is Shougo going to tell him? But regardless of their shared past, Kise doesn’t have the right to ask that right now (however, there certainly are other questions to ask about Shougo’s appearance).

“What’s with the cornrows?” Kise asks.

“What, you don’t like them? I thought they’d make me look tough.”

Kise snorts. “They make you look like you think you look tough.”

Shougo rolls his eyes. “Whatever. At least I’m not wearing makeup.”

“So? What’s wrong with a little bit of foundation and cover-up? I can’t look my best every day, you know.”

Shougo snorts into his coffee.

“What? I was always the pretty one,” Kise says.

* * *

Kise had met Haizaki Shougo when Shougo moved to Tokyo in second grade; by then Kise was already bored and alone. He could do pretty much anything the other kids did just by watching once or twice, and he’d go on to perfect their jungle-gym climb or backflips or dime-store magic tricks, and although at first it made the other kids think of him as the cool kid who could do everything, they all turned on him when he did what they considered to be their special thing (in Kise’s mind, it couldn’t have been all that special if it was that easily copied, but he knew better than to voice that thought).

Of course, the teachers loved him and let his mediocre-to-bad grades slide; after all he was a charming child who participated in class and seemed as if he was trying his best (not that he particularly was, but they didn’t have to know that). And though school wasn’t his favorite place, the older girls still cooed about how precious he was in the schoolyard and generally kept the kids from his class at bay (wimps) with their mere presence.

And then Shougo showed up in the middle of the year, hair already grey and with cowlicks in it everywhere, untied sneakers and skinned knees and a glare on his face that looked more emo than tough. Kise didn’t like him at first, wrote him off as just another person unworthy of his time—until he’d found himself chased down and cornered after school by the usual classroom gang, only Shougo was there too. He was a shitty fighter, but wild and loud and unpredictable enough to get the bullies to back off and run away, and he’d drawn all their attention away from Kise, too. Standing there with a bloody lip and two curled fists, he’d looked at Kise and Kise had looked back and, well. If the enemy of his enemies wasn’t his friend, he certainly might be a useful ally.

The sort of affiliation-by-default eventually faded into the closest thing Kise had ever had at that point to genuine friendship. He never went to Shougo’s house (Shougo never invited him), but Shougo went to his plenty of times and even if he had no manners and Kise’s sisters teased him he was always welcomed back. And with two of them together, the other kids were more likely to leave them alone. They shared stories and played video games and traded insults and just sat together on the playground sometimes, watching things happen, and Kise was almost content.

And then Shougo moved again in the middle of the next year, to another prefecture; he and Kise promised to write or call but neither of them ever mailed a letter or dialed each other’s number, and that had been that.

* * *

“If you want to know, you can just ask,” Shougo says, leaning back against the chain link fence in the park.

The basketball players on the other side lose control of the ball and it bounces over to a corner. Kise supposes he could feign ignorance, but there’s no point to it, really.

“What happened, then?”  
“Cancer,” says Shougo. “My third year of middle school. They found out too late.”

“I thought someone told me you got bitten by a shark?”

Kise cringes inwardly as the words escape him; luckily Shougo laughs.

“That’s what I tell people. It makes the girls swoon. That or I was in a fight.”

Kise snorts. “Why tell me the truth then?”

Shougo shrugs, curling his fingers around the links in the fence. “You deserve to know, is all.”

Shougo’s not the kind of guy (or he didn’t seem like it back then, at least) to pay dues to a long-ago friendship, but Kise supposes they’ve both changed since then, in more ways than one. And maybe, now that their edges are a little bit dull, now that they have other options, it wouldn’t be bad to rekindle what they had. The sun comes out from behind a cloud, shining directly into Shougo’s eyes, and he swears under his breath and it sounds like something sweeter, more important than it should be.

“You want to hang out this weekend sometime?” says Kise.

“Sure,” says Shougo, still squinting into the light. “But I get to choose the place.”

* * *

 

Kise’s not all that surprised by Shougo’s choice of venue; the dance club a little bit gritty but still far more on the side of safe, dingy and lit up on the outside by too-bright neon signs but the inside relatively pleasant and not quite overflowing with dancing throngs and loud music.

Kise’s actually kind of been wanting to see Shougo in action with the ladies—at first he seems surprisingly smooth, making shit up about how he lost his arm in a shark attack or a fight, but Kise figures him out pretty quickly. He goes for a certain type of girl, a girl who takes more than a few seconds to size him up and check him out, and then he’ll only go for the ones who are already drinking. And he never tries to actually get anywhere for a bit; he’ll talk with them for a bit and maybe dance, but he always loses them on the dance floor. Kise’s stomach wrenches when a very pretty brunette gives Shougo a wink—he feels like maybe he shouldn’t be feeling like this, but maybe it’s just been a damn long time coming. But it’s also Shougo, abrasive and hotheaded and way too aggressive for his own good, and there’s no real reason for Kise

And soon enough, a fight erupts and he’s at the center; security guys are making their way in and pulling him out of a pile-up, a guy in a leather jacket snarling at him, something about Shougo hitting on his girl and how people like that are what’s wrong with the world. Kise can feel his own mouth curling into a sneer; Shougo’s an idiot but this guy doesn’t seem all that smart himself. Kise buys another drink for the girl who’s been hitting on him all night and goes off after Shougo and the guy out of the club.

It’s cold for fall in Tokyo; the other guy is wrapping his jacket around his girlfriend, who is tugging him away even as he shoots glares at Shougo intermittently. Shougo’s fist is still trembling; his eyes look a little bit wild and he’s biting on his lip. He looks a little bit cold, although even if Kise had a jacket he probably wouldn’t offer it (and it’s not like Shougo’s the kind of guy who will admit to being cold in the first place). And maybe it’s the cold and maybe it’s the alcohol and maybe it’s just an impulse, but Kise leans in and presses a kiss to Shougo’s dry, cracked lips, quick and soft. When he pulls back, Shougo doesn’t look happy.

“Don’t fucking pity me,” Shougo says, snarling and doing that lip curl thing that may or may not be his trademark by now.

He pushes Kise away, stands back, grey eyes sparking with the crackle of electromagnets. He looks so fucking hot like this, backlit by the neon rainbow, the muscles on his arm clearly contoured and the dynamic feelings so clearly running across his face (and Kise was right in that Shougo would never really learn not to wear his heart on his sleeve—not that Kise minds at all, but still).

“This isn’t pity, idiot,” Kise says, leering back—enough for confusion to cross Shougo’s face and deepen the wrinkles between his eyes. “I don’t let people I pity hang around me for too long, believe me.”

“Then you expect me to think you fucking like me like that or something? This isn’t a joke?”

“Shougo-kun, you really are simple.”

Shougo jabs him in the chest. “And you’re an asshole.”

“But that’s why you love me,” says Kise.

“We’ll fucking see about that,” says Shougo, but he’s leaning in closer.

Kise closes his eyes, and is rewarded with a pinch on the cheek. When his eyes snap open, Shougo is snickering.

“So you don’t want a real kiss then?” says Kise.

“I didn’t say that,” says Shougo. “But I couldn’t pass up that opportunity.”

“Fine,” says Kise, grabbing Shougo’s face and pulling it toward his. This kiss is sloppy and Shougo’s tongue is everywhere, and it’s a little bit awkward but he tastes like too-sweet fruity cocktails but a little more bitter, and a little bit closer to perfect.


End file.
